Show those motherf*ckers you're serious!™

October 31, 2004

2004: Year of the “Don’t Vote for Me” Campaign

Ralph Nader, the only progressive alternative in the 2004 election, is constantly forced to discuss the inane idea that he took votes away from Al Gore in 2000. Nader’s principled answer is often to state that candidates do not campaign in order to ensure votes for their political opponents.

ReverseVoteSwap.org is mounting a serious Reverse Vote Swap campaign for Nader because we see that he represents the only progressive alternative to the Bush administration. This does not mean, however, that we necessarily agree with all of his analysis. Specifically, we call into question this idea that getting votes for oneself is the principle reason for candidates to campaign. In fact, the majority of political parties and campaigns in 2004 are in fact using their exposure in order to support others. This is why 2004 is the most bizarre and counter-intuitive in living political memory.

Whereas the Nader-Camejo ticket is logically encouraging votes on November 2nd for Nader-Camejo, this campaign is one of the very few actively encouraging voters to vote for itself. ReverseVoteSwap.org has assembled a report on various political parties and campaigns operating in the 2004 election so that our loyal supporters might better understand their aims and purposes. Our conclusions might surprise you! The truth is that thanks to the negative influence of the twin reactionary campaigns of Bush and Kerry, most political organizations are campaigning against themselves. Please examine our coverage of this bizarre phenomenon: 2004 and the “Don’t Vote for Me” campaign.

Bush-Cheney

The right-wing fundamentalist Bush-Cheney campaign, despite never once telling the truth to American voters, is actually the most honest of the reactionary campaigns. When Bush and Cheney urge Americans to vote for their anti-worker, pro-war, pro-corporate campaign, they are actually doing so out of a desire to get votes. This puts them in contradistinction to the Kerry-Edwards camp.

Kerry-Edwards

The purpose of the Kerry-Edwards campaign is a nuanced one. However, within this nuance, at no point do Kerry and Edwards actually work toward the aim of getting themselves elected to the White House (see JohnKerry.com for ample proof). If they were working to convince people to vote for them, they would logically campaign around issues that are attractive to voters sick of Bush and Cheney. As an example, a good way for them to get votes might be to actually call for a different policy in Iraq, rather than to call for the continuation of Bush’s policies and declare that a “fresh start” for the US.

Therefore, since Kerry and Edwards have done nothing to encourage their progressive base to support them, ReverseVoteSwap.org can only assume that the primary aim of the Kerry-Edwards ticket is to create a false sense of a “choice” in order to dupe voters into not voting Nader-Camejo. The political aim of the Kerry campaign is thus to ensure plenty of votes for Bush, not to get Kerry elected president.

Nader-Camejo

As previously discussed, the Nader-Camejo campaign is openly calling for progressives, radicals, left-wing Green Party members, and others who rightly understand the reactionary nature of the Bush and Kerry campaigns to vote Nader-Camejo on November 2nd. The “Vote for Us” tactic has been chosen exclusively by the Bush and Nader camps in 2004, proving conclusively that the only choice offered to voters this year is to vote for Bush or for Nader. We think it likely that any votes for Kerry will be officially tallied for Bush, although we cannot yet be certain. Kerry may instead drop out of the election on its eve, calling for his supporters to vote Bush to insure the defeat of the progressive Nader-Camejo campaign. Therefore Nader was mistaken to suggest that the primary goal of any political campaign is to get people to vote for it. Only the Bush and Nader camps are actively pursuing votes for themselves.

Cobb-LaMarche

The Cobb-LaMarche campaign is explicitly calling for votes for the reactionary Kerry-Edwards ticket. Whereas Kerry and Edwards, while campaigning for a continuation of Bush’s policies, will ultimately likely check the box next to their own names on Election Day, Cobb and LaMarche will not even go that far and will instead likely vote Kerry-Edwards, which is what they tell their eight supporters to do as well.

The Reform Party

In the strangest move of the 2004 campaign, the arch-reactionary Reform Party is calling on its members to vote Nader-Camejo. It is indeed a strange thing to see the staunchly anti-immigrant Reform Party tell its members to vote for the Nader-Camejo ticket, which is composed of one child of immigrants and one immigrant. ReverseVoteSwap.org can only assume that the “Don’t Vote for Me” theme of the 2004 election, as advocated by Kerry-Edwards and Cobb-LaMarche, has confused both progressives and reactionaries alike. Therefore as a service to any of our right-wing readers, we suggest that rightist Buchananites do themselves a favor and choose between either Bush and Kerry. This will reduce electoral confusion, as it will insure that all reactionaries vote for either Bush or Kerry and that the entirety of the Nader-Camejo vote is from progressives working to smash the right-wing two party system. The “Don’t Vote for Me” campaigns are confusing enough as it is without confused right-wingers working against their own interests by supporting the progressive Nader-Camejo ticket.

Other Parties and Campaigns

ReverseVoteSwap.org understands that on some ballots, other candidates might be listed besides those discussed here. These are simply electoral satire perpetrated by state election boards and are not to be seriously considered. We find it criminal that this satire is not labeled as such to prevent voter confusion on Election Day, but unfortunately ReverseVoteSwap.org is not yet large enough to exert complete control over the electoral process.